Zimbabwe Fact of the Day

"She told anyone prepared to listen, that a 2 litre bottle of milk cost Z$10 000 on Tuesday, but 24 hours later it was Z$17 000. Someone paying for milk at the next till snapped: "There wasn’t any milk yesterday."

So what is that in real money? Well depends on the hour of the day as the Zimbabwe dollar is depreciating all the time. In the morning the new price of milk would have been about £1. Later in the day it would have been down to about 98 pence.

That's on the black market, the only money market these days. Madly illegal of course, but everyone does it, especially the ruling Zanu PF, and the money police, the Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe.

Legally that milk would cost about £36, (if the calculator on the mobile can be trusted) as the official rate of exchange is US$250 to one Zimbabwe dollar."

That’s foreign correspondent to The Daily Telegraph, a Zimbabwean, Peta Thornycroft

Also listen to this interview with the Peta at CFR, ‘In Zimbabwe, 'Economy is the Opposition'

See also the following posts on her blog;
When bread becomes a luxury
The price of a bag of maize
The pie and doughnut guide to inflation

Related; Inflation Gone Wild